December 18, 2013

The New York Times featured an article on the high rates of "autism" among Somalis in Minnesota, but noted that it seemed different from the similarly high rates of autism among Minnesota whites because none of the Somali "autistics" had IQs over 70.

In other words, it's not like Ludwig Wittgenstein or Glenn Gould-style autism, it's severe retardation.

Retardation is also common among Pakistani immigrants in the English Midlands, due largely to high levels of cousin marriage.

What about Somalis in Minnesota? From Wikipedia's article on "Cousin Marriage:"

A bill to repeal the ban on first-cousin marriage in Minnesota was introduced by Phyllis Kahn in 2003, but it died in committee. Republican Minority Leader Marty Seifert criticized the bill in response, saying it would "turn us into a cold Arkansas."[112] According to the University of Minnesota's The Wake, Kahn was aware the bill had little chance of passing but introduced it anyway to draw attention to the issue. She reportedly got the idea after learning that cousin marriage is an acceptable form of marriage among some cultural groups that have a strong presence in Minnesota, namely the Hmong and Somali.[113]

Somalia doesn't show up in A.H. Bittles' tables on Consang.Net, but here are some studies of cousin marriage in other cultures not hugely dissimilar:

For what it's worth - Living in an area heavily enriched by Somalis, one can't help but noticing that they, to the undiscerning eye at least, all 'look the same', just like the old cliche says.All of them seem to to have the same basic face and head shape. Universally, the males are tall and skinny. Universally the women are tall and big - paricularly in the posterior, which I'm lead to believe is a millenia old sexually selected for trait. Honestly, to the casual observer in that degenerate hyper-diverse human zoo once known as London all Somalis look like members of the same family. Whether this is evidence of extreme endogamy and cosaguinity, I know not.

I'm not aware of evidence for a serious negative influence of cousin marriage on intelligence, and the practice is prevalent among some (like south Indian brahmin castes) known for acuteness among their neighbours.

She has a phd in biophysics from Yale and a masters in public health from Harvard, according to that bio. You'd think she'd be aware of the risks of inbreeding. I don't quite understand why she sponsored that bill - unless she was doing it to attract negative attention to the practice? The quote Sailer cites could be interpreted that way. Otherwise, I don't get it.

I'd be wary of comparing Somalis, or their Ethiopian and Eritrean neighbors, to either the Bantus to the south or to the Congoloids to the west. All they share is the superficialities of skin tone, hair and lips-- which they all share with the totally unrelated (except through Adam) Papuans.

Nonetheless, it's useful to keep in mind J Philippe Rushton's observation that the Africans whose IQs he measured at 70 and lower were completely healthy in every way. They just didn't get much when the intelligence ladle passed over their trays. On the other hand, Westerners with IQs of 70 are almost always suffering from some malady.

Also, can an intelligence test given to an autistic be trusted? Particularly to one so far outside his element.

First cousin-marriage bans are unique to the US and centered in the Midwest. CMIIW, but I believe they're a holdover from the eugenics movement. If so, they and the Vatican agree on something. Funny it took Galtonians to impose the Pope's wishes in Protestant America.

Get this: the ban on cousin marriages extends to same-sex marriages in Minnesota, Iowa and, soon, Illinois. I'm no geneticist, but I understand the incidence of birth defects in those is quite low… At least Illinois has a loophole if one spouse is sterile. But in most gay couples, neither one is.

Furthermore, Iowa, like Massachusetts, never got around to 'degendering' the existing consanguinity law to retrofit SSMs. (It was imposed by court in both states.) So an Iowan cannot marry his first cousin, but he can marry his brother. Figure that one out.

"She reportedly got the idea after learning that cousin marriage is an acceptable form of marriage among some cultural groups that have a strong presence in Minnesota, namely the Hmong and Somali."

Brilliant - because emulating backwards cultures and encouraging their worst behaviors is exactly what civilization should be doing. Let's not elevate them to our standards, towards practices which would improve their lot in life.

Leftists have just gone fucking insane. "Tolerance" and "diversity" is all and everything. Defending culture, civilization, the citizens of this country isn't simply of no concern to them - it is actually evil.

To understand this, imagine her trying to legalize cousin because "cousin marriage is an acceptable form of marriage among some cultural groups that have a strong presence in Minnesota, namely white migrants from Kentucky and Arkansas."

Would. Not. Happen. Which explains everything about the modern Left that you need to know.

First-cousin marriage was very common among the Mennonite and Quaker families in this country through the end of the 18th century, and in certain branches (like the Quakertown founding families) the practice persisted to the middle of the 19th century. It was a reflection of religious conscience, not ignorance. And, we should not forget that William and Mary, and Victoria and Albert, were first cousins, and they weren't Arkansas hillbillies. Legislators should keep their ill-informed pop-eugenic notions to themselves and refrain from meddling with other people's marriage choices.

Are they still practicing FGM (Female Genital Mutilation) as they did in the old country? Somalis practice an extreme version of it and the vast majority of females are subjected to it. It makes for rather unpleasant reading.

Judaism does not prohibit cousin marriage, though it is no longer common. Its prevalence in the past may be one reason for the high rate of Jewish genetic diseases. Is there any research that cousin marriage actually causes retardation?

Kahn was aware the bill had little chance of passing but introduced it anyway to draw attention to the issue. She reportedly got the idea after learning that cousin marriage is an acceptable form of marriage among some cultural groups that have a strong presence in Minnesota, namely the Hmong and Somali.

Gotta love the logic here - and I'm willing to bet that all the deep thinking that this legislator put into the issue is given complete expression by "but it's their culture!".

Hey, Ms. Kahn, how about introducing more legislation "drawing attention" to some other "acceptable forms" of cultural expression found among your constituents? I'm looking forward to your bills legalizing clitoridectomy and infibulation, and making sure they're covered by obamacare.

Sure, they'll die in committee on the first go-round, but the important thing is to draw attention and raise awareness, then we can fight on to inclusive and multicultural victory from there. That's how we got the ball rolling for gay marriage, and now, polygamy. You go, girl!

I found some numbers in a 2007 report from Norwegian health authorities.

Of a sample of 3,373 Somalis, 6.9% were married to first cousins and 2.8% to second counsins. There were also some instances of other familiar relationship or unknown. 82,6% of couples were reported to not have any familiar relationship.

This is relatively moderate compare to the Pakistani group where among first generations 43,9% are married to first cousins and only 44,5% report no familiar relation at all. Even among second generation Pakistanis in Norway 35,1% marry cousins and only 47,8% marry outside their family (5,7% unknown).

About 17% of first generation Turks and Moroccans are married to cousins and 13,0% of Iraqis.

Love the crack from the Republican caucus leader. The Stupid Party at work. Someone might point out to him that the most prominent practitioner of cousin marriage in this country today is...Rudolph Giuliani.

Quite a number of states allow proximate cousin marriage. It is just that the practice is quite atypical for reasons of personal preference. (It was fairly common in one branch of my family in the 19th century, not since). Metropolitan development and lower transportation costs tend to reduce the comparative attractiveness of your cousins (along with the decline of the share of the nation's income stream derived from agricultural land).

Steve, do you have that chart of mental capabilities that Linda Gottfredson had on her CV website? It listed the capabilities of people with various IQs: "can follow simple instructions but needs constant reinforcement", "cannot read a book above a first grade level", etc.

I believe it also listed the sort of job that each IQ could handle: "common laborer", "stock clerk", "cashier", "college professor", etc.

I would love to look at the capabilities of 70 IQ folks, but cannot find the chart.

All deviant behavior is acceptable even when severe consequences for things like cousin marriage are readily observable.

I bet every reader at Slate or the Atlantic would readily support marriage between first cousins if the topic was presented as African or Islamic civil rights being suppressed by evil Muricans or Europeans.

Child brides and female genital mutilation would also fall under this same umbrella.

Obviously, the solution to this crisis is to import more Somalis and Hmong. It's obvious to our politicians anyway. I'll be on the lookout for a Somali particle astrophysicist who saves the world in the next big budget Hollywood offering.

Do they go down, because migration brings them into contact with a broader pool of their co-ethnics/co-coreligionists in the new country than back in their isolated villages at home? (As happened when Sicilian peasants moved to America)

Or do they go up, because chain migration to a 1st world country through marriage is a valuable resource not to be shared with outsiders? (I get the sense this is the case with Pakistanis in the UK)

Presumably it varies by culture, as cultures which treat women more like property are going to have more power to force them into cousin marriages, and also for migrant groups that keep to themselves (as opposed to living in the chaotic and intermingled world of the Lower East Side immigrants at the turn of the century)

However, Lewis notes that the collapse of public order has pushed the Somali toward clan endogamy. "The tension between this politically expedient practice and traditional cultural precepts was reflected in the popular view that such endogamous marriage amounted to a kind of incest akin to the mating of animals." (pp. 51-52)

One more note from I. M. Lewis on Somali cousin marriage: Not only do Somalis traditionally try to avoid marriages within patrilineal clans, but "the children of sisters ... are regarded as being too closely related to marry, although I have recorded a few such marriages. Marriage between a man and his mother's brother's daughter ... sometimes occurs but is not a preferred union with a high incidence." p. 52. (Somewhat more common were marriages to more distant female relations in the mother's brother's patrilineage.)

Lewis worked in Northern Somaliland, and there may be some variation in space and time, but it doesn't sound like rates were very high. Phyllis Kahn may have been trying to accommodate a practice that isn't even a very deeply rooted tradition.

Judaism does not prohibit cousin marriage, though it is no longer common. Its prevalence in the past may be one reason for the high rate of Jewish genetic diseases. Is there any research that cousin marriage actually causes retardation?

John Stossel the TV libertarian announced a few weeks ago that the bad effects of cousin marriages was a 'myth'. He said - cheerfully - that if you want to marry your first cousin, go ahead - it's OK.

An honest scientific study on cousin marriage and other forms of inbreeding - as opposed to one based on fear, superstition, and moralism - will uncover the facts. Inbreeding is probably not as harmful as "they say it is", and magnifies existing genetic diseases and defects rather than creating new ones. The ancient and medieval Jews knew a few things about genetics (and eugenics) and could protect themselves from the bad effects. Muslims did not.

Another not-well-known inbred ethnic group: Serbs. They do not seem to have suffered genetic harm from their consanguinous Zadruga extended family traditions. Their Orthodox Church does not seem to have followed the same laws as the Catholic Church.

w/r/t Somali intelligence, I am somewhat sympathetic to the notion that tests are culturally bound. However, this has it's own problems. Many African languages have words for "one" and "many" but not "two" or even "a whole ton of" vs. "a handful". Or for instance they have no words to describe the past and the future as coherent entities. There is a "now".It doesn't surprise me that such people have extreme difficulty with math (which is built upon gradations in numbers).For a very fascinating read of the role of african language check out

guy is an expat philosophy prof who has taught at various african universities and has a knack for language.

Havign said all this, though, it doesn't quite matter if their 70IQ is "real" or their seeming score of 70 is an artifact of their inherent innumeracy, either way we as The West are much much better off with fewer rather than more of them

There used to be quite a bit of inbreeding among various immigrant European groups a century ago - whether this is attributable to the limits of travel (marrying within a few miles of one's home village) or traditional cultural/religious patterns, I don't really know. Jews traditionally had high rates of first cousin marriage, and I have read elsewhere that Uncle/Niece marriages are also religiously authorized. Perhaps Ms. Kahn has such unions in her family background and wishes to validate them?

I've also found a tremendous amount of first/second/third cousin marriage among Southern Italians - those arriving as immigrants and to a slightly lesser extent among the first generation raised (not necessarily born) in the US. After that, however, it drops off precipitously, and marriages to other Europeans (Germans, Irish, English, etc.) increase dramatically. These are only personal observations from genealogical research, however; don't know if these patterns are comparable for the larger population.

Related to this post, does anyone here watch Parenthood? There's one child character who has Asperger's. I don't know how accurate the portrayal is, but Asperger's comes across essentially as a blend of tactlessness and obnoxiousness.

cousin marriage is certainly not a particularly positive thing, but given the wide range of where it is practiced I'd hesitate to assign it as a cause to severe mental retardation.

"Maybe in a saner world we could ban immigrants from such places. Let them stay home and enjoy the fruits of their cultural trappings." - Only in a saner world. Chain migration works best with the tribal/clannish structure produced by cousin marriage. Not to mention illegal immigration.

How big is the impact of a single instance of first cousin marriage? My impression is that it's pretty small. But a culture that encourages cousin marriage gets a lot of individuals with a whole lot of branches on their family tree occupied b the same person....

An honest scientific study on cousin marriage and other forms of inbreeding - as opposed to one based on fear, superstition, and moralism - will uncover the facts. Inbreeding is probably not as harmful as "they say it is"...

Goddam Puritan moralists at it again, keeping us away from our attractive cousins.

I imagine a lot of data already exists, and upon examination will tell us that.."well, it depends".

I doubt anybody's tradition of frowning on cousin marriage comes from a belief that a one-off cousin marriage is in dire danger of producing monsters. (Prepare to see this straw-man trotted out 24/7 by people trying to change consanguinity laws, though.) Loose patterns of cousin marriage are probably more common than not in history, for obvious reasons. Some farther-out-on-the-tree cousins here, a few closer kin there over time, no problem. The real issue is a long-term pattern of marrying very close relations - first cousins, uncle/niece - generation upon generation. Does John Stossel know for a fact that the elevated level of health problems reported among, say, British Pakistanis has absolutely nothing to do with their particular pattern of cousin marriage?

And as any reader of Steve ought to know, patterns of cousin marriage and anti-cousin marriage result in different kinds of social structures. Not that libertardians are interested in those aspects.

I suspect that the consequences of consanguinity depend on the specific alleles which are being propagated. In other words, if high IQ people interbreed, their kids are more, rather than less likely to have an IQ similar to their parents, rather than regressing to the population mean.

I doubt anybody's tradition of frowning on cousin marriage comes from a belief that a one-off cousin marriage is in dire danger of producing monsters.

Very few anti-CM prohibitions are eugenic in nature, anyway. Many of them are economic. I think that people need to understand the history before they can make informed decisions.

Loose patterns of cousin marriage are probably more common than not in history, for obvious reasons. Some farther-out-on-the-tree cousins here, a few closer kin there over time, no problem.

Survival trumps morality and castor-oil legalism. In every remote mountain village in the Balkans and Caucasus, the residents needed to marry their cousins in order to propagate future generations. They never had the luxury of listening to some pope sitting on his ass in Rome.

And as any reader of Steve ought to know, patterns of cousin marriage and anti-cousin marriage result in different kinds of social structures.

Patterns... That's the key word. Consistent patterns over time. Also, many of the societies with heavy CM, practice arranged marriage as well. It's in the hands of the parents and out of the hands of the kids. Both individuals and societies, left to their own devices, will practice some CM, but not make it the predominant way. Only with a great tradition of arranged marriage comes near-exclusive cousin marriage.

Not that libertardians are interested in those aspects.

No, they do not believe in society at all, and like John Galt, ran away from home and society at age 6, fed clothed and educated themselves, built steam locomotives with their bare hands, yadda yadda yadda.

A friend of mine once expounded the view that cousin-mating (if not cousin-marriage) might explain the IQs of inner-city blacks in the US, and how they might have actually declined in the last fifty years. Given that the lines of patrimony have become blurred or often even non-existent in that population, people are likely mating with close relatives without even knowing it.

"The anthropologist Carleton Coon also pointed out that by minimizing the number of relatives a Bedouin Arab nomad has, this system of inbreeding "does not overextend the number of persons whose deaths an honorable man must avenge."

A friend of mine once expounded the view that cousin-mating (if not cousin-marriage) might explain the IQs of inner-city blacks in the US, and how they might have actually declined in the last fifty years. Given that the lines of patrimony have become blurred or often even non-existent in that population, people are likely mating with close relatives without even knowing it.

I doubt it. Some posters here seem to have the idea that cousins are some sort of sirens that will entrap the unwary unless stopped by draconian legislation or at least moral shaming. Cousins in general are no more attractive than anyone else, and the closer cousins even less so. There actually have been studies on this, and they have found that people are motivated (in terms of mating and marriage) by a certain amount of genetic distance.

Cousins in general are no more attractive than anyone else, and the closer cousins even less so.

It seems fairly obvious that there would have been more cousins hooking up (married or otherwise) when families were bigger and most people didn't move far from where they grew up. If your parents each had six siblings, you might have a dozen cousins of the opposite sex within 5 years or so of your age, all living near enough that you saw them frequently and got to know them well.

Now, with smaller families and many kids moving away for college or jobs, most kids don't see most of their cousins except a couple times a year on holidays.

Autism is not merely a matter of mental retardation. The key symptom that is noticeable even to the untrained eye are the repetitive movements (self-stimulatory behaviors or "stims") that characterize the syndrome.

he findings came as long-awaited validation for Idil Abdull, co-founder of the Somali American Autism Foundation. She said she struggled for years to try to persuade officials there even was a problem. Abdull, who lives in Burnsville, said autism was essentially unknown in her native Somalia, but her 11-year-old autistic son barely speaks a word.

So, rather this silly writer discuss the findings and ask the abvious question of if autism did not exist in oral Somalia, why is it high in Minnesota? He takes a racist turn and adds cousin marriage. Then if any of the low IQ and racist White posts here would've said - well cousin marriage accounts for over 20% or world marriages and they doni have this high severe autism, so it must be some environmental trigger. As the saying goes, those with few brain cells insult others.

And most Somalians that came as refugees have a birthdate of January 1st. Just like racehorses. They have about 4 surnames, and declare their children to be about 6 years younger than they are to entitle them to years more of welfare. They are not an honorable community. I worked with hundreds of them in section 8 housing. Criminals. Deport them all.

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